The invention relates to a device for controlling a vehicle component alterable dependent on transverse acceleration, particularly a shock absorber, depending upon a control signal which represents the transverse acceleration and has been acquired by a computer, the said computer being supplied by a tachogenerator responding to the vehicle travelling speed and by a steering angle sensor responding to the steering lock.
Such devices are used, for example, for the regulation of the chassis of a motor vehicle (adjustable shock absorbers of an active chassis). A partial aspect of such a chassis regulation is to counter-act rolling motions of the vehicle, i.e. rocking motions of the vehicle around its longitudinal axis, for example as a result of fast cornering. With this system, the knowledge of the value of the transverse acceleration brought about on the vehicle by centrifugal forces permits a detection of the rolling, even before great rolling angles of the vehicle have occurred, and thus a derivative rolling compensation within a regulation strategy for the chassis.
In principle, a direct detection of the value of transverse acceleration by means of a transverse acceleration sensor is conceivable. The detection of the value of transverse acceleration in a computer from the value of a vehicle speed detected by a tachogenerator and the value of a steering angle detected by a steering angle sensor, however, has the advantage that the rolling of the vehicle generally can be detected even earlier.